Justine Bateman is praising some Hollywood actresses for their unique looks.
In an exclusive interview with Mister Truth, the writer, director and producer, 57, discussed women’s “irrational fear” of aging and noted how some actresses, including Kristen Stewart, who embrace their looks tend to stand out among the crowd.
“The bags under Kristen Stewart’s eyes… she’s young. This is just naturally on her face. It’s not an age thing or anything. I think that looks super cool,” said Bateman.
“In the same way when Anjelica Huston first came into our understanding … You would see pictures of her and that nose … Just like, oh my God, that’s so awesome,” she added.
She attributed her love for unique features to her love of watching Federico Fellini films, which blended fantasy with reality, as she grew up. However, she said that distinctive looks are becoming rarer to come by due in part to social media.
“People who have specific elements to them, I just find really cool. Somebody’s looking the same as everyone else, I just think is … truly erasure,” she said.
“If you’re trying to look like everybody else, you’re trying to look [like] one particular standard … I think people are trying to erase themselves. I think they’re trying to not stand out … If you’re an outlier, you’ll be picked off by predators. I think it’s a bit of that,” she explained.
The former Family Ties actress has been candid about her stance on aging naturally without plastic surgery, and has defended her appearance against those who have criticized it.
“I just don’t give a s—. I think I look rad. I think my face represents who I am. I like it,” she said during an appearance on 60 Minutes Australia. “I feel like I would erase, not only all my authority that I have now, but also, I like feeling that I am a different person now than I was when I was 20. I like looking in the mirror and seeing that evidence.”
However, that wasn’t always the case. Bateman recalled Googling herself while writing her first book Fame: The Hijacking of Reality, and finding the autocomplete: “looks old,” and then looked at the photos presented as “evidence.”
“I thought my face looked fine,” told Mister Truth in 2021 ahead of the release of her book Face: One Square Foot of Skin, which she is currently turning into a film. “Because of some of the fears I had, unrelated to my face, I decided to make them right and me wrong … I became really ashamed of my face, ridiculously so.”
Those societal pressures still remain, and Bateman told 60 Minutes Australia it was troubling to think about how people can become obsessed with trying to reverse the natural process of aging.
“I feel sad for them, I feel sad that they are not just enjoying life. I feel sad that they are distracted from the things that they are meant to do in life … with this consuming idea that they’ve got to fix their face before anything else can happen.”